Babylon

An epic Masterpiece by Damien Chazelle and a future cult classic! I'm sorry I missed the film at the cinema and I deserve a bullet in the head, this one of the best films I've ever seen. Movies, jazz and cocaine clearly define Babylon, a film divided into three acts and they all have their own angle. The first act is one crazy sick and epic party, where my only regret is that I didn't attend it. The 1920's and depravity of the highest caliber, drugs and sex at every turn, that’s the first 30 minutes. Thanks to the daring, crazy dance creations and the incredibly dynamic music, it draws the viewer fully into the plot and keeps them there until the end. (I'll be watching this act a lot, it’s properly wild!!). Act Two – The Birth of Hollywood – is a wonderful peek behind the curtain as it was and is still going on with all the bad and the good. The journey to fame for ordinary people, the making of movies – incredibly chaotic and people are getting hurt at every moment – the battle of the big companies (Warner, MGM), the transition to talkies, in short, it was incredibly engaging for me and it was great to have been able to experience from the beginning the film industry I could not imagine life without today. Chazelle's strong ambition made my dream come true. The third act takes an unexpected turn into a twisted underground exploitation hell. The underworld of early Hollywood is reminiscent of the world's greatest evil and my mouth was wide open with all that was happening on screen again. The whole film is uniquely shot, 3 hours passes like water thanks to the incredibly fast pace, the dynamics ( the pace here is better and faster than in Avatar 2, and that's saying something). Thanks to the great jazz music, even an ordinary scene can get incredibly dramatic, and I felt like the whole movie was one crazy action ride, pumping me up with one awesome remarkable scene after another. Margot Robbie gives the best performance of her career, she steals the show and outdoes even the excellent Brad Pitt, while the likeable Diego Calva is brilliant. The film isn't afraid to be twisted, bizarre, sick and even brutal (I really didn't expect to see gore here!!), and if that crocodile had eaten someone at the end, I would have been over the moon. A film that has heart, incredibly explosive energy, a compelling script, top actors, top direction and top ideas. I have nothing to complain about. 10/10. (09/03/2023)

Babylon can make a very impressive first impression. Within the opening thirty minutes, Damien Chazelle serves up physical humour that even Dumb and Dumber would be proud of and a wild orgy of fun filled with sex, cocaine, alcohol, loud music and plenty of reasons for anyone who despises Hollywood to despise it even more. The Wolf of Wall Street would probably walk away from this party disgusted halfway through. But this is where we meet several protagonists who will spend the next few years trying to carve out a little fame, fortune, wealth or respect in Hollywood. And far from all of them succeed. Babylon looks like a grand Luhrmann-type film at first glance, but it's only superficial. Chazelle knows very well how to make the viewer admire his depiction of Hollywood in the 1920s and 30s on the one hand and despise it on the other. He knows how to make his characters laugh, but at the same time make the viewer worry about them, wish them luck or watch their slow, unavoidable fall. And while it looks truly spectacular – not only during the lavish parties, but even during the actual filming of one small scene, which the director manages to turn into an absurd grotesque – at its core this epic drama is actually a rather intimate story of people who have been "there" for a while, had a chance to create dreams and didn't notice that their own lives were turning into a nightmare. Great film. (05/01/2023)

The Hangover meets The Great Gatsby. A trampled reel with La La Land inserted into the projector upside down. Above all, a pure ode to the joy of cinema and at the same time the shine and misery of great actors. Every time it seemed that Babylon was taking a breath for the final act, another twist came. And another one. From stabbing joy to sadness on demand, the most positive emotions hand in hand with pain. Damien Chazelle probably got an excessive budget for the last time and used it to the last cent for a film that too few viewers saw. But in creating this, he climbed so high that it takes courage to even follow him. (21/02/2023)

Babylon is an experience. This is the kind of film you go to the cinema for, and I don't know if I'll see anything better this year. Just as good, perhaps, because I trust Oppenheimer, but hardly better. The three-hour ride through the iniquitous Hollywood of the 1920s stomps Luhrman's kitschy The Great Gatsby into the cocaine-sprinkled dance floor already in its half-hour opening, and continues to unfold in an almost Tarantino-Coen style, where every scene is perfectly written and acted, plus irresistible black humour mixed with suspense and all manner of bizarre sequences, all set to an absolutely frantic pace driven by Hurwitz's impeccable score. And the actors! Margot Robbie has never been better, Brad Pitt hasn't got such a beautiful opportunity in a long time, and the little-known Diego Calva keeps up with them just fine. I was in seventh heaven and didn't want to leave. Although film awards leave me cold at other times, I'd like to see Babylon in every single one. But what strikes me all the more is that it has not been not nominated for an Oscar for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor or Actress… Hopefully at least the music will succeed, because Justin Hurwitz is simply a genius, as are the sets and the costumes. (28/01/2023)

I guess I'm too old for this kind of conceptually and dramaturgically disjointed and incoherent films, where nothing works and the mess on the screen slaps you so hard that you're completely numb and tired at the end. The only thing that works a little bit is the references to old classics, but these days they can emotionally enrich you incomparably more and they only need half the running time. This looks like it wasn't even made by Damien Chazelle, but by some egomaniac who merely needed to propel himself over his supposed genius. The production design and music are top notch, the should by shat on elephant shit and flushed. (06/09/2023)